Arthur Daye
}}Blue Bucket |- style=background:#000000 |'Species:' | style="width:17em" | }Human |- style=background:#000000 | Age: | }35 |- style=background:#000000 | Date of Birth: | }April 15, 2131 |- style=background:#000000 | Occupation: | }Mercenary |- style=background:#000000 | Location: | }Earth (born, served in Afghan DMZ), Katamayla, Trendalay, various other Primacy colonies, Bekenstein, Illium |- style=background:#000000 | Marital Status: | }Divorced |- style=background:#000000 | Height: | }5'9" |- style=background:#000000 | Weight: | }205 lbs |- style=background:#000000 | Relations: | }Lena Calhoun (ex-wife, divorced), Andrew Calhoun (son), Sarah Calhoun (daughter), Deven Calhoun (son) |- style=background:#000000 | Affiliations: | }Nassa D'Veya, Lucas Dunn, Lessina Moore, Kim Avery, Friegsid "Katamayla" Khor'shok, various other officers and enlisted men of 9 Commando. |} Early Life Arthur Daye was born on the west coast of the UNAS to a well-to-do family in San Rafael, California. His father, Johnathan Daye, had served a four-year stint as an officer in the UNAS Army in the Military Police before working for the local police department, and the elder Daye began gently pushing his son into following in his footsteps of service. Young Arthur was regaled with tales of far-off lands, of barracks-room hilarity, of bringing liberty to oppressed people like when his father served in the coalition that liberated the Falklands during the third war that those islands lent their name to, and soon found himself dreaming of a career as an officer and a gentleman. Unforunately, his academic prowess was not sufficient to get him enrolled in the UNAS Military Academy at West Point, and so Arthur found himself taking an alternative path to a commission, through the ROTC program at the University of Santa Clara. Daye was by all accounts a conscientious and motivated cadet, and it was during his first year of college that he saw an auburn-haired vision of feminine perfection almost falling asleep in his PoliSci course. This was Lena Calhoun, and thus began a long courtship (or at least as close as tge admittedly lowbrow Daye could get to one) that eventually culminated in Daye taking her to his Military Ball that year, and by the end of his sophomore year, the two were eventually dating. Art continued to earn top marks in his ROTC courses and instructor's eyes, but his academic performance elsewise was less than spectacular, merely enough to get by. But when the time for branch selection, his instructors had spoken highly enough for him to get his top pick of the infantry. On the day he commissioned as a Second Lieutenant, he proposed to his beloved Lena. Overjoyed, she accepted. Early Service For a while, the two were a perfectly happy couple, as Daye completed his infantry officer's training and received a cushy posting stateside with the UNAS Army's 1st Infantry Division. For him and Lena, this was the life---he finally got to be a soldier rather than a kid playing at one, and she got to be with the man she cared about with all the benefits of being an officer's wife and none of the risks. The couple had three children during Daye's home front posting: a daughter, Sarah, and two sons, Andrew and Deven. But as time went by, Daye began to grow bored of the constant dog-and-pony shows and drilling with no practical application. On top of that, promotions in the officially "peacetime" military were hard to come by without seeing service in a hot zone. So when the call went out for volunteers from the 1st ID to serve with the peacekeeping forces in the Afghan DMZ, Arthur Daye's name was at the top of the list. The DMZ Daye was given command of an infantry platoon out of the 1st Infantry's 4th Brigade Combat Team upon his arrival in the DMZ, and was assigned to Firebase Zulu in Helmand Province. Daye's attitude began to noticeably harden during his first tour of duty in the DMZ, and not just to the degree experienced by a soldier new to combat. When his unit gave an Afghani child candy, that same child thanked them by producing a pistol and shooting Daye's platoon sergeant; the village of Musa Qala, ostensibly friendly, was in reality one of the most hostile places Daye's platoon visited. By the time he received his Captain's bars and command of Hotel Company, Daye was a much different man from when he'd arrived in the DMZ. His swagger and dash had been replaced by a jaded, grim outlook on the peacekeeping mission, the officer and gentleman gone in favor of a harder, bitter, more uncouth persona. His previous dedication to upholding the established rules of engagement was replaced by a penchant for shooting first and getting positive ID on-target later. This newfound aggressiveness was cultivated and nurtured amongst the NCOs and junior enlisted of Hotel Company, and the unit soon acquired a reputation for excellence in combat and little else. In barracks they were rowdy and light on discipline, on peacekeeping outreach missions they were inclined to find hostile intent where little existed. This came to a head when Daye was given orders to "pacify" the village of Musa Qala, which was host to one of the largest insurgent strongholds in Helmand Province. Believing that no one in the village was friendly to the peacekeeping forces, Daye and Hotel Company carried out a systematic extermination of the entire village, utilizing artillery, close-air support, and house-to-house raids to eliminate all 2,000 souls living there. Within a day, news of the butchery had reached high command, and Daye was relieved of his command and placed under close arrest. He was soon court-martialled, and received a dishonorable discharge, the loss of his pension and benefits, and a veritable media circus leading to his infamy in the UNAS as the "Mad Dog Murderer of Musa Qala." Civvie Street Daye and Lena had always been scrupulous with their finances, so the family was able to live comfortably while Art tried to look for a job. But while Daye had left the DMZ, the DMZ had yet to leave him. Nightmares, flashbacks, an inability to relax even in the confines of his own house plagued the man. Whenever Daye would start work at a job, he would inevitably be fired within a week, for a toss-up of reasons raging from his supreme disagreeableness to being listless while at work. But Daye and Lena soldiered on all the same, trying their utmost to make a normal life for their kids. It wasn't to be. One night, in the midst of a flashback to an attack on his outpost, he shot his son Deven in the chest, mistaking him for an insurgent sapper. For Lena, weary of putting up with the traumatized brute her husband had turned into, it was the last straw. She initiated divorce proceedings, and wound up with full custody of the three children. Daye was denied visitation rights, and kicked out of the house the day the verdict was handed down. The Blue Suns Daye's violent propensities and undeniable competence at soldiering did not, however, go ignored. The Blue Suns had long been using the horde of former UNAS officersas a potential recruiting ground, and Daye exhibited the ruthlessness, tactical savvy, and propensity for violence that they looked for in their officers. After nomination and confirmation by a recruiting board, the ex-Captain soon found a new message in his e-mail inbox offering employment with the Blue Suns. Initially Daye balked, disgusted by the idea of prostituting his skills for so little pay. The Suns countered by raising his initial pay rate, promising immediate deployment to a combat zone, and a promotion to the rank of Major and his own command to boot. The newly-minted Major sent in his letter of acceptance the same day. The Suns had decided that someone with Daye's unique approach to counterinsurgency was needed on the colony worlds of the Hanar Illuminated Primacy, where a wave of insurrections done under the aegis of the DLF were taking place. The Primacy colonial governments, in an unusual move for the Hanar, were willing to hire on Blue Suns units to augment their local forces. Said units were to deal with the insurgencies with whatever mehods they saw fit, and it was into this rather volatile mix that Art Daye was thrown. Katamayla Daye's first deployment with the Suns was on a hanar colony with a mouthful of a name, Katamayla. The colonial governor, hanar President Moisetsho, had requested three battalion's worth of Suns shock infantry to assist the Katamaylan Army in crushing the local rebellion, and had had that request answered in the form of three shock trooper Commandos, one of which Daye was given charge of. WIP Bekenstein Trendalay Katamayla, redux Personality and Traits Relations Nassa D'Veyra Lucas Dunn Kim Avery Lessina Moore Category:Mercenaries Category:Humans Category:Characters